Wednesday, 10 August 2016

Someone posted a question on a social medium lately and it got me thinking. Since I haven't written a blog in some time I decided to write my thoughts here so that I can share it in multiple apps.
Here is the question: If you could only choose one of these options which would it be: a) have a child or children, but never get married or b) have a good marriage but not have any children?
I hope no one reads too much into this or is offended by anything I have to say because I'm only speaking from my point of view and not saying either is right or wrong. It seems to me like single parents would almost always choose a) in hindsight. What about married parents? What would hindsight make them favour? Are we conditioned or even pressured to choose having children in hindsight? How would couples who aren't married and don't have children choose, I wonder?
As a single man with no children I'm more focused on the choice, looking towards the future, of those who have not had either. For me personally, I know that if I could choose I'd choose b). Why? Partly because someone once said "you never miss what you've never had". I have had a few relationships, not many, but enough to know what it's like to have a woman in my life and I would love to have the best of that experience long-term. I have never had children and I think I would be completely overwhelmed by the responsibility of raising a child to be honest, even with the help of the child's mother. But a woman who is my life companion and best friend as well as my wife and lover is something I know I would cherish as long as not having children isn't a problem. She isn't dependant on me, she's with me because she chooses to be. I know it wouldn't be perfect or a fairytale happy ending but it would be nice to have someone that we can strive to make our relationship work. I often think how one of my life goals is to have a good woman in my life. It's difficult for me to achieve it, considering how wary and guarded and defensive and introverted and sometimes nervous I become at the thought of interaction with strangers, but I do work on it in the background when the opportunity presents itself and sometimes my mindset is good for interacting with women. I know what it's like to be lonely and I know feeling lonely wouldn't be a regular occurrence if I was waking up beside a special lady every morning.
It is possible, of course, to have children and love & live with the mother of the children and not ever get married. That is a way to have the best of both worlds and still be sticking to the options as layed out in a) and b). I'd settle for that because I'm not religious and don't care about religious teaching in relation to children outside of wedlock. But I think I'd choose the marriage option anyway because of what I said earlier about the responsibility of raising a child. If I had to choose between a loving wife or having children right now the choice is easy.